


Prisoner Mine

by meanoldauthor



Series: Mean Old Lady [6]
Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Cuddling, Enemy Lovers, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-09
Updated: 2015-11-09
Packaged: 2018-04-30 18:05:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5173934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meanoldauthor/pseuds/meanoldauthor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How can you hope to survive, trapped alongside a mortal enemy?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prisoner Mine

From the ridge, Marius was invisible to NCR troops below. They were sorry things, fleeing from the rout of Nelson, back to Searchlight. His lip curled as he raised a spear, heard the call of his decanus. This would be mercifully short action, the horizon already blocked by a rising storm.

They scattered, the cowards, as the Legion waded into them. The rocks and broken land gave them shelter, but the panicked troopers were no match. The wind whipped higher as Marius hunted them, driving them from cover and into the blades of his squad. The last few clung stubbornly on, older, maybe, more wily. The sky grew dark, and he heard a shout from his squad--to Nelson, leave the rest.

Sand stung his exposed skin, hissed off his goggles. There was a scuff on the far side of the nearest boulder, and he rounded it recklessly fast. A rock slid underfoot, and he felt his face dashed on the stones, a sharp pain biting around his eye.

He ripped his goggles free as he stood, blood flowing. The sand was in his eyes as soon as they opened, and he staggered towards the cliff face. There was a cave behind him, hidden in the cliffs--he had camped there while observing the town. The blowing dust cut his vision down to mere feet, and he stumbled into one of his squad.

"The cave," he shouted above the wind, gripping them by the shoulder. His eyes were running, near blind no matter how hard he wiped at them. He spat sand and pulled up his scarf. "To shelter! Let the storm have them."

They pulled him along, towards a shadow ahead. The roar and sting of the storm was cut off, and his squadmate was coughing, the sound echoing. Marius felt at his face, unable to tell what was tears and what was blood. He leaned on the cavern wall, trying to compose himself. "Brother, my eyes. Have you water, or healing powder--"

Something hard pressed against his back. "I've got a twenty-gauge shell. Want to see what it does to a man's spine from point blank?"

Marius froze. He tried to blink the sand from his eyes, check if the left one was still intact. He couldn't make out the wall in front of him. "Woman, you think to hold a man of the Legion captive?"

"I d- yeah. I'm the one with the gun." He could hear the quiver in her voice. Pathetic, that the NCR thought their women could face the rigor of combat. "Put your hands up, and... Just don't move."

He felt the barrel of the gun shift, heard her reach for something. His hand was on his machete as he turned, slashing at neck height. He staggered away from the flash and thunder of the gunshot, the blade jerked from his hand. He heard it strike the ground, followed by a scuff and rattle as it was kicked away. "Don't try- You're unarmed! Don't try anything funny, or the next shot goes through your head."

"Don't you threaten me, woman!" He faced the sound of her voice, unable to make her out in the dimness. The wind still howled outside the cave mouth, even louder than before. "Lay down your weapon. Even unarmed, you are outmatched. Surrender as a captive of Caesar's Legion, and I will not be forced to harm you."

"I'm over here," she said, and he pressed his lips thin as he took a half step to his left. There was a scrape if her picking up his machete. "And you're crying."

"I'm n- I'm wounded!" His voice cracked, and Marius tried not to wilt. "Give me all your healing supplies, profligate."

"No." There was a click, and he shaded his face against a flashlight beam. "Damn, you got messed up. Did one of us do that?"

"I'm... Keep your questions in your head, woman! Know your place." He felt himself flush. "You are my captive, and you _will_ obey my commands."

"Uh... Yeah, sure, buddy." A rustle, and her voice came from lower down. "If that makes you happy. I'm one with the gun."

"You already missed once."

"You've got a booger."

Marius scowled. The light wandered across the cramped cave, showing only bare rock and drifted sand. She sighed, and he tensed, ready for some quip. The woman stayed silent. He sank to his heels, ready to spring at the first chance.

None came. The cold of the wall ate into his back, making him grow stiff and sore. He tried to wipe his face on his scarf without drawing attention.

"The Searchlight platoon will hear about the battle, and send a squad to retake the base," she said. He started, the long silence leaving him complacent, and he yanked the fabric away from his nose. "Then we'll have one more prisoner of war to feed."

"Long wait, profligate." The light from the cave mouth was fainter than before, the wind keening like an injured beast. "Would they risk a storm for a lost cause? A lone soldier who may not have survived? My brothers were born to this, honed by these storms. They will find us, take you captive."

"Put a- Just- Shut up."

Words were his only weapon now. The quiver was back in her voice, and he pressed on. "Maybe they trust in my return, and I take you back myself. Another NCR soldier to question. They will wring from you every ounce of information you might hold, leave you so broken you won't even be useful for target practice."

"They'll look for me. NCR doesn't leave people behind," she said, but he made out the shape of her, saw her hunch.

"We train our recruits how to slit throats on soldiers like you."

She muttered something, below his hearing. "Speak up, woman."

"Technician," she said. "Not even a real soldier. Just a radio technician." She sputtered, started to giggle. "Why do you think I ran? God, you'd like like an idiot, bringing someone like me back. I don't know anything about troop movements or, or weapons or whatever. I can-" she was laughing in earnest, with the brittle edge of nerves "-I can teach you how to splice a cable and, and do a foxhole radio. Should I show you, buddy? Wait, you can't even _see!_ "

"The injury is minor!" He put up a hand as she shone the light at him again. "Cease this! I order you to be silent!"

"And look at you! Aren't you a little weedy to be a Legionary? You have chicken legs under that skirt!"

"Silence!" But even he heard the petulance in it.

"Aww, did the bigger boys pick on you for being short, too?" she said. "Poor baby."

"I am a frumentarius! I don't need to be a musclebound oaf to do my duty, you harlot!" The light was off him, and he could only imagine the grin on her face. "My battles are won on cunning and wit."

"And name-calling? Oooh, I surrender, take me in now. Are you crying again?"

"It's _sand!_ " His voice broke on the word, and he tried to blink his eyes clearer. They felt red and raw, and he felt the cuts around the one trickle blood at the motion.

"Uh huh." She sat back, unbothered. "That looks painful."

"Less painful than your nattering."

"'Nattering?' Spare me, I'm just a poor woman and left my dictionary at home."

"You likely haven't the mind to read." She stuttered and spat, and something in her hand caught the light. "You claimed you had a shotgun. Where is it?"

She shrugged, waving the pistol. "I was bluffing, dummy."

"So what stops me from rushing you here and now?"

"It's still a _gun_ , chicken legs. You'd get two steps, tops."

"Could barely take two steps in this forsaken hole," he muttered.

She rested the light on the ground, pointed at neither of them. She watched him when he looked away, gaze darting off whenever he faced her. He took the chance to wipe at his eyes, clear them further.

"You're making them worse, rubbing at them." He frowned at her, took one more swipe at his eye. She shrugged. "Everyone knows that. If you rub, you just push the grit deeper."

"I am no fool, and you are no doctor," he said. "I have no interest in speaking with..." No, wait. Use this. _The bear is crippled by its own laws._ He could almost hear one of his mentors speaking. _Use this. Most will follow them to the death, even in defiance of sense._

"You are right." He sighed, looked away. "You have... bested me, woman." He forced himself to sound contrite. Even as a lie, the words rankled. "I am your captive. I surrender."

"Really."

Marius shifted, trying to let blood return to his numb legs. He gave up on his crouch to sit normally, making the woman train the light on him, gun ready. He spread his hands wide. "I am unarmed, alone. I cannot see. I am in pain, and request medical care."

"You won't die," she said, propping up the light to shine at the ceiling. "So shut up and don't move."

"You would let a man go blind?" He shook his head. "Woma... Ma'am. I thought the NCR had regulations about prisoners of war. Would you have me suffer?"

"I've seen what you people do. Chrissakes, I just watched you rush Nelson. Suffer away."

Marius kept the frustration out of his voice, barely. "Ma'am, I am in no position to harm anyone."

"Huh."

"I may trade... Information, for treatment."

A rustle from her, the light turning to him. "I've seen you people lie, too." But was doubt in it, and he waited, letting his head drop, apparently despondent. "But..." He cocked his head. "Hold your hands out."

He obliged, fists and forearms together, leaving his wrists slightly apart. He hardly saw her approach in the dark, but there was a flash of the side of a gun. "You try anything, chicken legs, it's- it's lights out."

"Of course." A cord wrapped over his wrists, was looped hastily around and pulled tight. He heard her canteen slosh beside him, and he relaxed his arms, putting plenty of slack in the bindings.

"Tip your head back. Don't move." He fought back a flinch as she poured tepid water over his eye. "I said don't move." She put a hand on one side of his face, holding it still. He blinked, the burning less intense. She moved on to the other side. "You've got glass in these cuts."

"My goggles were broken." She shifted her grip, hands soft and cool. _Weak, useless,_ he told himself. _Unfit in every way._

He still had to swallow, try and slow his breathing.

"You get hit or something?" She was plucking at the cuts, making him set his jaw.

"... Yes. I do not know by what. The storm was already upon us." So close, he could make out her features. Not a hideous woman, brown skin and hair, with a narrow, nervous face. Goggles hung around her neck. He could pick out the delicate lines of her throat as they caught the light. Such thin, fragile skin. One hard blow to choke and silence her, though it would be a pity to crush something so...

She looked up from her work long enough to meet his eyes, and her hands darted away. "You should be okay," she said, rising and stepping away without turning her back. "If you can see now, it should all heal."

"Very well." He waited for her to settle. She looked at the tunnel leading out of the cave, slowly filling with sand. Marius hooked a thumb under the cord on his wrist, working a loop over his hand.

"OK. Now talk," she said. Marius stopped fidgeting. "I help you, you help me. What information do you have?"

"None to share with the likes of you, profligate," he sneered. "A woman is no match for a man of the Legion. Fool."

She spat at him. "Go fuck yourself with a rattlesnake, skirt. We'll drag you back to McCarran, see if- make you talk"

"Such biting wit!"

"What's 'chicken legs' in Latin?"

"It's--" He tried not to flush.

" _Gallus?_ No, attributive."

"You're not--"

" _Crus Gallinaceous_. More or less. Bit of a mouthful."

"You cannot believe a Legionary would be called something so--"

"Yeah, something punchier. _Macer_ isn't terrible, isn't it?" she said.

"Woman, shut--"

"'Scrawny' is a decent translation, I think. Well? Is that your n--"

" _Marius,_ " he shouted. "I am Marius, and it is a _proud_ name, honoring Mars himself!"

She held up her hands, looked away. Marius watched the storm rather than stare at her, red faced from his outburst. The wind showed no sign of letting up, hours since the attack. By the time it was full dark beyond the cave mouth, it only seemed stronger.

"How do you know Latin? I thought the NCR had no room for sympathizers." Marius wasn't quite looking at her, or she quite at him.

"Just because you speak it doesn't make you an automatic jackass," she said. "I like languages. It's why they put me on radio, in case I heard you guys chatting."

"We use more reliable means, rather than enslave ourselves to technology."

She smiled, humorless. "Also why I'm just a knob jockey." Panic hit her. "I'm n- that sounds--"

He snorted. She flushed.

The growing cold made his fingertips numb. The profligate woman clutched her knees to herself, and he could hear the rattle of her teeth. She watched him from the corner of her eyes, gun in hand, keeping him from loosening the cord further. Unarmored, bare-faced, she barely looked a threat.

"Do you- d'you know how to b-b-build a fire?" she asked, voice small.

He looked away, realizing he was staring. "In a cave? Yes, let us both smother, it would be a mercy," he said, teeth gritted to keep them from chattering. "Serve me. Remove your coat."

"S-s-- Th-the only thing getting served is your- is your balls on a plate of you lay a hand on me!" The pistol was raised again, shaking too hard to aim.

"I--" He didn't hide his revulsion. "I wouldn't sully myself on you, profligate, no matter how you bat pretty eyes at me."

"P- p- p- _pretty?_ Don't you call me pretty, you bastard!"

"Your coat, woman!" He hadn't called her that, in name of Caesar had he actually-- He made himself look down his nose. "Or I'll kill you and take it from your corpse."

"How? Eyeball me to death? Your hands are tied." She sat back. "I won't give you anything. We can both freeze."

They glowered at one another, shivering. "You will die either way, profligate."

"D-don't have to," she said, expression going grim. "I mean, both of us... And..."

"No."

"You won't get girl cooties."

"Cooties are not--" He shut his mouth. He had stopped shivering, and his lips felt thick and dumb. "What do you propose."

"You do something for me." She raised the pistol by the barrel, holding it away from herself. Slowly, she lay it beside her. "You wanna run, prisoner, now's your chance," she said, mumbling.

The wind still hummed outside, disorienting, full of grit that would take skin from a brahmin. "Death sounds preferable."

"Then run, chicken legs! Aren't you supposed to kill yourself rather than be taken captive?"

"I... Legionaries do not fear death," he said, a little too high. He steadied himself. "But to die over this... _farce_ would be a sorry waste."

"You're scared."

"I fear no woman!"

"I see you picking at that rope! If you meant it, you would have attacked me, gun be damned."

At least this time, she didn't gloat at his scowl. "A truce, then. Get this over with."

She shuffled to her feet, and he forced himself up to a crouch. The trooper knelt beside him. He recoiled as she reached out, and she flinched.

Setting her face, she pulled at the buttons on her coat, "I guess it would..." He tried to take it when she shrugged it off but she tugged it away, holding it over her shoulder like a blanket. "T-turn."

"Only because you're an unblooded woman," he said, enunciating around his numb face. "Haven't the nerve to stab me in the back."

"Just shut _up_." Her jacket barely covered his chest, draped over the two of them. He tucked his arms in tight, laying on his side, stiffening as she pressed herself against his back. "You tell anyone I did this a stab in the back's the least of your worries."

"If word of this reaches me, no wall will keep you safe." His skin prickled as the warmth of her worked through his tunic. Her hand was laying on his side, and he tried to pull himself away.

"Stop wiggling." She reached over him, sliding closer.

"Remove your hand!" He pulled it away from his chest, grimacing at the squeak in his voice.

"Your not gonna die! Where else am I supposed to put it?" She tucked her legs up behind his, and he bit his tongue. "What, it's like you've never even _met_ a woman before."

"I have never needed to!" She _was_ warm, warmer than the too-small fatigue coat would have been. "Legion women know their place. It is tending fires and bearing children, not interfering with the affairs of men."

Blessed quiet. Perhaps she took the words to heart. He pulled his arms closer to his chest, the heat at his back only making the cold sharper.

He could feel her breath through the fabric of his scarf. "Talk to your mother with that mouth?"

Damn her. "My mother would have been a savage. Better she was put in line by the Legion," he said. "My brothers in arms were more fitting caretakers."

"So...you were young?" she said.

"Caesar spared me the half-life of a feral thing," he said, suspicious. "He has given me purpose."

Silence, silence. He worked the cord off his wrists slowly, trying not to alert her. Marius looked to the cave opening, willing the dawn to come faster. The flashlight faded, fusion battery within burning away.

When his eyelids started to droop, he forced his body tense, tricking it back into wakefulness. Behind him, he felt the trooper stir. Her hips were pressed against his... back, her legs under his thighs. He could feel her breathing evenly below the line of his armor.

"You know I... feel bad, sometimes." Her voice was drowsy, dull from sleep and cold.

"If you seek to atone for your dissolution, I have no interest in it."

"No. It's that..." She sighed, ruffling the hairs on the back of his neck. "You're just... So many of you are kids. Or were. No one gave you another chance. I've seen legionaries on the field younger than you and me, and they're the scary ones. They don't know anything else."

"You think it makes you superior, that you chose to be a soldier?" he said. "The bear's a two headed thing, secrets are kept between them. You only know as much as they tell you."

"You th- You wanna bet it's no different for you?"

"We are bringing order to a cruel world," he said. "That's all that matters. Our enemies must die to achieve it."

"You're going to die doing it."

"So may you."

She curled up tighter, her forehead nearly coming to rest on the back of his neck. He drew a sharp breath at the touch. "Think I don't know that? What'll happen if I'm captured? I'm scared. I don't- I --" She gave a bitter laugh. "I'm telling this to _you_. What the hell."

"If you fear death, then you lived for nothing." He felt the hollowness in the words, echo of his teachers, his superiors. "Your... struggle is of no interest to me, woman. Your fear. It matters only that the bear and bull stand on opposite sides of the Dam."

"Nothing personal?" she said, voice wry.

Marius pressed his lips thin, considering. "No. I care nothing about you people. Your ideals are what I disagree with."

"So..." Her fingers tapped against his chest, idle, a thinking gesture. His heart tried to speed up to match. "Would you be willing to negotiate? Peacefully?"

"We are far beyond such things," he said. "But I have no desire to kill more than necessary."

"I never wanted to kill anyone."

"Says the woman who willingly became a pawn."

"I only signed up because Dad said it would be good for me," she said. "Didn't consider that he lost a leg to the Brotherhood. Not a great judge. But yeah, it was still me who chose to enlist. I thought I could help people. Get a leg up on a career."

"Have you a point?"

"You just... Were taken. Forced, since you were a kid." Marius frowned, but before he could cut in, "Even if Caesar turns you into fanatics, you can't tell me you're not scared out there. You can't all be the crazy butchers we make you out as."

The light had faded to a graveyard glimmer, the battery nearly dead. "My life is nothing, in the march of progress. I would die for my cause."

"You don't sound convinced."

_Soft. Useless. One of the enemy._

And still less blind than he.

"The Dam..." Marius had never given voice to the words, and stopped to order them. He could nearly feel her listening. "If we lose this battle, it will break the Legion. It will take up too many of our men, draw our supply lines too thin. Even if we win, Caesar is an old man, and Lanius will supersede him." He wanted to check over his shoulder for listeners, but there was only her, someone with no face, no name. "I've...met the man. He is an animal, not a leader. There is a chance the Legion will not survive after Caesar, no matter the outcome of the next battle."

"What happens after?"

His mouth was dry, lips chapped in the cold. He licked at them, considering a lie. The words came out smaller than he intended."I don't know." His doubt, his questions, raised to any one of his superiors... "I do not think I will live to see it."

Her hand was still on his chest. It pressed tighter, slipping underneath his armor. He jumped, trapping her arm under his.

"S-sorry..."

She tried to pull her hand away. Marius held on, pressing it close. "The threat stands, should anyone hear of this."

"Maybe that's why you're all weird and high strung," she said. "Human contact isn't a Legion thing, is it?"

"It serves no practical purpose." She could probably feel his heart hammering. "Unnecessary."

"So... never? Are you not allowed?"

The light was gone, restricting the world to soft heat and cold stone, the keening wind. "Too young. Not allowed a wife, and taking a slave..." He shook his head. "Some of us... come to agreements, but know we would be crucified for it."

"Hm." Quiet. Why had he told her? Kill her, kill her rather than free her, even as his prisoner she might-- "What's your name?"

"Marius. As I have said." What was this?

"Your real one, before you were Marius."

"I recall nothing else." He drew himself away from her. Dissolution, treachery. This woman, this mere _radio operator_ wasn't some agent provocateur to talk him out of--

"Kim."

No reaction. He heard her shrug. "Not that you asked or anything. But that's my name."

She shifted closer, taking up the chill gap. He clenched his teeth, refusing to rise to it. Against him, her breathing returned to the slow, even draw of sleep.

The cave mouth was starting to lighten when he woke, laying on his back. She had slid down beside him, tucked under his arm. Marius watched her a moment before sitting up. She woke as he tried to lay her down, murmured, "What time s'it?"

"Dawn." Their weapons were still on the far side of the cave. He climbed to his feet, trying to shake off the stiffness. "The storm is passed."

"I can see..." She trailed off as he picked up the pistol. The fear on her face was clear when he turned, but tempered with something like resolve.

It would have been easy. She was the enemy, had learned of doubt in the Legion ranks. One bullet, at close range.

He looked at her. She lifted her chin, waiting. Both knew it would be a kinder death than capture.

He held the gun out, grip first. She holstered it and began to button her coat. "If you surrender, they'll do anything for information. I'll make sure you're treated fairly." Marius sheathed the machete, not looking at her. "Come back to Searchlight with me."

"Fair treatment still ends in an execution." She looked away. "I will not. We both know what Caesar does to the dissolute," he said. "You do not wish to know what he does to traitors."

She reached for his hand. Marius stepped towards the cave mouth. "Ten minutes. If there are NCR, I will avoid them. If there are Legion, I'll lead them from you."

"Yes." He didn't look at her, didn't want to see the look on her face. "... Thank you."

"Do not return to Searchlight," he said, stopping mid-stride.

"Why?"

"Nelson is taken. Desert, be reassigned... But do not be in Searchlight in the next week."

Marius didn't wait for a reply. Better to be rid of her. One more complication he didn't need, one more reason to doubt.

As he walked out onto the sun, he rested a hand over his heart, where hers had been.


End file.
